


that's enough for now (he should have never left you broken)

by stardustandswimmingpools



Category: Bandstand - Oberacker/Oberacker & Taylor
Genre: 'he wrote about you a lot in his letters' oh did he now, Angst, Canon Compliant, Canon Dialogue, Character Study, F/M, Implied/Referenced Character Death, KIND OF. it's complicated lmao, Letters, M/M, Polyamory, anyway., because that is the bootleg i have lol, come on. it's practically canon, donny/michael is implied but like, in media res kind of?, the entire fic is canon dialogue and i took it from the broadway previews
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-18
Updated: 2020-04-18
Packaged: 2021-02-23 14:29:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23712988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardustandswimmingpools/pseuds/stardustandswimmingpools
Summary: He looks just like Michael said. Charming. Beautiful. Skinny. But there’s this thing that’s missing, this thing Michael always talked about in his letters. His attitude, his voice. Maybe the Donny that cracked jokes died at war too.-A look into Julia's thoughts during her first two interactions with Donny.
Relationships: Donny Novitski & Julia Trojan, Donny Novitski/Michael Trojan, Julia Trojan/Michael Trojan
Comments: 8
Kudos: 31





	that's enough for now (he should have never left you broken)

**Author's Note:**

> will i keep mining songs by the fray for fic titles until theyve all been used up? yes i will. title from enough for now by the fray.  
> sorry not sorry about this entirely canon dialogue fic but im just really....emo lmao  
> i just watched the bandstand proshot on playbill and it FUCKED ME UP i forgot how much i love this show. i wrote this fic awhile ago, probably just after watching the bootleg for the first time, and then never did anything with it cuz i don't usually post stuff that doesn't have a happy or like, hopeful resolution. but this sort of felt complete, and anyway i just wanted to post something because i love bandstand so HARD and i want to appreciate the fuck out of it  
> so in other news: this fic takes past donny/michael as canon, and julia a consenting wife about it. but like. i don't know if it counts as poly because michael died? before donny and julia ever met? it's complicated but yeah that's the sitch. also, as the tags say, the dialogue is from broadway previews (the better version imo because of jimmy's scene). so don't come for me about it.

Julia opens the door and there's a man walking away from it.

“Aren’t you a little old for ding-dong ditch?” she says harshly. He turns around, and something in Julia’s stomach sort of...lurches. Like she knows him, almost. Like they maybe knew each other in another life. He has this look on his face. Like he’s lost. Or like he recognizes her. Or like he wishes he recognized her.

“You’re Julia,” he breathes. Julia frowns.

“Do I know you?” She wipes her hands on her apron, feeling suddenly conscious of her getup.

“No — I recognize you from your picture.” He still has that look. The lost, familiar one. Julia sighs.

“Well, I hope there’s no picture of me looking like this.” She glances back inside — the cake will be done in a moment. “Are you gonna make me yell down the sidewalk, or do you want something?”

“No, I’m — Donny Novitski, I was a buddy of Michael’s in the 37th.” Julia’s stomach drops. Donny Novitski, the famous Donny Novitski, of the soft hair and golden eyes. She can see it now. All of the letters flash to the forefront of her mind, like when you stand up too fast and get a head rush. This is...him.

This is him.

“Who is it?” her mom calls, and Julia nearly panics.

“Just-just a friend of Michael’s, mom.” She pulls the door shut and steps outside, into the wind. He comes closer cautiously, like he’s afraid.

“I would’ve called first, but I-I didn’t have the number, and —”

“I didn’t mean to be rude,” Julia interrupts. She glances down at her outfit, and it suddenly seems so dramatically inadequate. “Gosh, I’m sorry I’m a mess, I was baking a cake —”

“Sorry to bother you,” Donny says, turning to go. Fear wells up in Julia. The fear of...him leaving. Of missing out on something so pivotal in Michael’s life. She rushes forward.

“No, no, it-it’s no bother.” He turns back to her, fidgeting with his hat. “He...mentioned you. A lot. In his letters.” Understatement of the year, perhaps. “How did you find me?”

“Michael gave me the address.” For a second there’s a hint of a smile, and it’s so easy and fleeting. But it hits Julia, then, why Donny would have their address in the first place. Would have  _ her _ address, now.

“And you’re supposed to check in on me,” she says slowly. 

Donny appears to be at a loss for words. Julia can’t blame him. He glances down at his hat, a prisoner between his hands, and finally he says, “I’m just, I’m awfully sorry.”

He’s so earnest. So...unashamed. Julia finds herself disarmed by his fidgeting, genuine nature. Admittedly, this Donny is very different from the one described in Michael’s letters. But then again, this Donny lost Michael too.

“No, I’m...getting along,” Julia says. The space between them feels colossal.

“Say, I, uh, I have some pictures of Michael from when we were over there,” says Donny, gesturing like he’s proposing something. Julia feels her heartbeat a little stronger.

“You do?”

“If you wanna see ‘em sometime,” Donny continues over her. “I-I didn’t think to bring them.”

Julia is disoriented. Weeks of nothing, radio silence, and then this: a beacon of light. Or of something, at least. Of closure, maybe. She says, “Um, sure.”

Donny pauses. “I should come back.”

“You could — come for dinner,” Julia offers. God, to have someone else in the house. Someone other than her mom. Someone who knew him. Who knew Michael. 

“I don’t want to impose,” says Donny. 

Julia waves him off. “How about Thursday? Say 5:30?”

Donny looks as uncertain as Julia feels. And quiet. God, he’s quiet. “Sure. If you’re sure.”

Julia nods and slowly backs up to her door. “I’ll...see you then.”

God. Donny Novitski. She gets a last look at him as he turns to go, just before she opens her door.

He looks just like Michael said. Charming. Beautiful. Skinny. But there’s this thing that’s missing, this thing Michael always talked about in his letters. His attitude, his voice. Maybe the Donny that cracked jokes died at war too.

Whoever he is, Michael loved him for something. Julia can’t help but think she’s going to find out what.

And he’s coming for dinner now. With pictures of Michael. Holy hell.

* * *

And oh God, he’s  _ here _ .

Julia rushes to the door and there he is, standing, holding a photo album and that hat from before and smiling easy. She recognizes him again. Donny Novitski from the letters. Or Nova for short.  _ It works with his name, _ Michael had written,  _ and it works with him. Kid’s like a supernova. He’s just got this endless energy. It’s amazing, Jules, you’d love him. _

“You look very nice,” he says. Charming. Julia gets it now.

“Well, it turns out there are better cosmetics than cake,” she says, matching his easy smile with one of her own. She has those in store now. The easy smile. A loose upturn of the lips. Very simple to replicate. Convincing to most people. Though maybe not to him, a victim of war, a victim of the loss of Michael too. “Come in.”

He crosses into their house and Julia’s mom is standing there, like she’s waiting to be introduced. “Mom,” Julia says obligingly, “this is Donny Novitski.” She takes his hat from him.

“Hi, how do you do,” Donny says, shaking her hand. 

“It is a pleasure to meet you,” Julia’s mom says. Donny’s eyes slide over to the piano and refocus there as he pulls off his coat.

“Which one of you plays?”

“Oh, I used to,” Julia’s mom says. “Back in high school.” She smirks. “In 1876.” 

_ He says he’s a killer pianist. I like a guy who can appreciate his own skill. I know you like that kinda guy too, Jules. I mean, you married one. _

“Do you wanna try it out?” Julia offers.

“Ah, maybe later,” Donny says.  _ He’s deflecting, _ Julia thinks. She drapes his coat and hat over the piano.

Julia’s mom says, “Oh, I hope so.” And Julia kind of gets it. It’s been far too long without music in this house. For a woman who married a musician, it’s strange to have it quiet. She continues, “Please, please, please, have-have a seat,” as Donny and Julia claim chairs at the table. “I have to get busy in the kitchen, but I have some deviled eggs that you can have as a fancy appetizer and I will have those out in just a jiffy.” Just as Julia is about to forcefully shove her out of the dining room, she turns and leaves.

The door to the kitchen closes, and Donny says, “Your mom’s nice.”

“She works hard,” Julia replies, smiling wryly. 

“Your dad?” Donny asks as they sit. Julia’s heart tightens, clenches, and she lies so smoothly it’s easy to believe for a moment that she’s telling the truth.

“Oh, uh, he’s traveling for work. A salesman.”

“What’s he sell?”

Julia pauses. “Uh, frigidaires. Of all things.”  _ Of all things. Jesus, Julia. _

“Must be hard to lug around,” Donny says. Julia chuckles good-naturedly. Donny does too.

And then there’s a silence. It weighs on Julia like a planet.

“Michael talked about you workin’ at Halle Brothers Department Store?” Donny says.

“The cosmetics department,” Julia says. “I’m still there.” Forever and ever, she will still be there. It’s eternal, that stupid cosmetics department. But it’s manageable. Right now, Julia needs things that are manageable.

“He told me you sing,” Donny adds. There’s a sort of intensity in his eyes. It’s intimidating.

“Well, I confine my singing solos to church these days,” she jokes. It’s true, though. Singing without Michael’s backup harmonies is hard, now. She’s accustomed to him, jumping a third above the tune and singing parallel to whatever she’s chanting. It was a good meld of voices. Her airy soprano and his gravelly tenor. He was a drummer first and foremost, but he had this rough kind of singing voice that made it a beautiful harmony. Her singing without him is laughable now.

“I’d like to hear you,” Donny says earnestly.

Julia almost laughs. “Well, unless you find yourself at Our Lady of Mercy this Sunday, that’s pretty unlikely.” She suddenly hopes he won’t play the piano later. If he plays, she’ll maybe want to sing along. And if she sings along she’ll probably start to cry.

_ He says he writes his own music. Seriously, Jules, this kid is a musical genius if his word’s anything to go by. He writes on all the scrap paper we get, you know. Bars, staffs, that stuff. It’s something to see when he’s writing. He gets this look. _

Julia’s mom comes out with the deviled eggs just then. She places them on the table, in all their paprika’d glory, a look of particular embarrassment on her face.

“Wow, mom?” Julia hazards, looking up at her mother.

“The, uh, the top of the paprika shaker fell off.” Her mom has the decency at least to look somewhat ashamed. “They say you can’t put the genie back in the bottle.” Oh Lord, Julia can’t even look at Donny. Her mom says, “I am so sorry,” then returns to the kitchen.

Julia can’t help but smile at her mom, even as she says, “I am so embarrassed, your mom is probably an excellent cook.” Donny’s smiling, waving away her apologies, but at these words his hands sort of fall to his lap.

“My mom,” he says, “she died when I was thirteen.”

Julia’s smile fades. “Oh. I’m sorry.”

“No, no!” Donny grabs his napkin. “I haven’t had a good home-cooked meal in...I don’t know how long, so I’m very grateful for this.”

Julia almost doesn’t want to ask, but something makes her. He does have this manner that completely disarms her. “What about your father?”

“Uh, we were never close.” This is apparently the matter, closed. Julia expects something more, but he finishes laying out his napkin on his lap and instead gestures to the photo album. “So I have these photos. Maybe we should wait ‘til after dinner.”

“Oh — no, let’s...look now,” Julia suggests. Everything felt smooth for a moment, but now it feels ruined like the eggs, spoiled, uncertain. Donny grabs the album and brings his chair closer to hers. 

He opens the book and Julia’s heart nearly stops. It’s the back of Michael’s head, really barely even a picture, and Donny flips past it, but Julia wants to grab it from him and hold it. She wants to stare at it until the back of Michael’s head is imprinted in her mind, until she has it memorized, until she can count all the hairs on his head. 

The next picture is Michael holding a gun, looking serious — so serious that Julia knows he must be joking. There’s a rushed scribble of a caption underneath it, and Julia can only just make out  _ Michael at boot camp _ . Donny says, “That’s in boot camp, when we met.” He says it so casually. Julia wonders if he knows. If he knows that Michael told her everything, in his letters. If he knows that she knows how little he’s showing. She drinks in the picture, Michael’s cheekbones, Michael’s fingers, Michael’s lips, all of it. It seems like Donny is too. He nods almost spastically for a moment before flipping the page again.

It’s Michael, skin darker in the black and white photograph, what Julia imagines would match the shade of the paprika on the deviled eggs, grinning widely. Julia’s heart feels like it’s leaping out of her ribcage, reaching for him. “That was in Fiji, right after we landed, he — I had a tan about ten minutes off the coast — I’m half Italian, he’s full Polish, so…boiled lobster.” 

Julia laughs back tears. “Happened every summer.” Michael’s skin had always been beyond sensitive to the sun, and his was always the first to lose the sunburn battle. The longing is building up in her chest like fire.

The next page Donny says, “This is a patrol we went on —” and it’s Michael in his uniform and Julia suddenly can’t take it. She hates to interrupt him, but it doesn’t take much.

She sniffles. “I’m sorry —”

“No, no, you can go through these later,” Donny says quickly, shutting the book and handing it to her. Julia can’t help but admire the gesture. It’s like he’s handing her a piece of his heart.

She’s not stupid. A photo album, ready-made, full of pictures of Michael? Why would he have that lying around before he met her?

She knows how it was, at war. She knows how  _ they _ were. She’s happy for both of them. Things are different when there are lives on the line; circumstances change. But for him to give her the only solid memories he has of Michael…

“That sounds like a good idea,” Julia says, smiling away the feeling like she’s going to burst into tears.

“Yeah. Yeah.” Donny pulls his chair back around, and Julia picks a different, more lighthearted piece of trivia from her knowledge of Michael at war and plays it.

“I, uh...I saw you wrote  _ Michael _ in here. Is that what you called him?” She knows the answer.

Donny unfolds his napkin on his lap. “Well, we did have a nickname for him.”

“Rubber?”

_ The boys have started calling me Rubber. They all think it’s a riot. I can’t outrun that nickname, can I? _

“Yeah, that’s the one.” His voice is like a kid being caught in a prank.

Julia giggles. “He had it in high school. Oh, and I got really good at the jokes. Um...Rubber, my best friend on Saturday nights. Rubber keeps me outta trouble.” She laughs.

_ Guess that’s what I get, with a last name like Trojan. _

“Guess that’s what you get,” Donny says, “with a last name like Trojan.”

Over and over again. He keeps hitting her right where he was. Julia can’t help it — she laughs. He’s so unapologetic and yet so reserved. Such a mystery, even though it feels like she knows him from Michael’s letters.

Julia’s mom comes out. “Alright, dinner is almost ready. Julia.” As she approaches, she says, “Oh, you didn’t touch the eggs!”

“We’ll have them with dinner, mom,” Julia says quickly. Yeah, right. Donny stands up too. Julia’s not sure why. Maybe so he’s not the only one sitting.

Her mom disappears into the kitchen, and she’s alone with Donny again. The burning question in the back of her throat suddenly forces itself out. She turns around. “Were you there?”

“Where?”

“Bougainville Island, when…he died.” The words are bitter on her tongue, sour, sharp.

He looks caught off guard, and Julia nearly feels guilty for asking. What kind of person does that? Even after her mom had said specifically not to mention it. And now there’s a look on his face, like a kicked puppy. 

“Yeah.”

Unfortunately, this answer does not sate Julia’s craving for knowledge.

She stares at him, and he stares back. There’s a total and complete loss for words hanging in the air, between them both.

“I hate deviled eggs,” she says, almost crying. “Be sure to tell my mom you like the roast, even if you don’t. Especially.” Nearly in tears, she hurries into the kitchen.

Her mom is there, fussing with the roast. When Julia enters, she turns around and gives Julia a look. That’s all it takes for her to understand.

“I told you not to ask,” she says gently.

Julia’s eyes water. “He was there, mom.”

“Sweetie, don’t do this to yourself,” her mom says, reaching for her hand and grabbing it consolingly. “Come on, we have a hungry mouth to feed.”

Julia wipes her eyes with the heel of her free hand. Her mom’s hand is warm and reassuring, and Julia takes a deep, heaving breath, then grabs a glass of water and downs it.

“Alright,” she says. “I won’t bring it up again tonight.”

Both of them can hear the exclusionary  _ tonight _ , but thankfully her mom ignores it. “Go on, put a trivet out,” she says instead. “This roast is hot.”

* * *

_ Hey, gorgeous! (That’s you.) _

_ War’s still war. In case you were uncertain. _

_ I write to you from Fiji. We just got here a couple days ago. It’s crazy beautiful out here. I’d love to take you sometime. You know, after the war ends and I get home and all that. I think you’d love it. It’s kind of ruined by the whole battle situation — the beauty of the place, I mean — but if you squint your eyes you can kinda forget about all the conflict and just focus on the water and the trees. _

_ In other news, I know I told you about this kid I met - Donny Novitski. I know you told me not to fall in love out here, Jules, but I just might. I love you, and I’ll always love you — I know you know that. We both know that. _

_ But god, Julia, if you could meet this kid...just a couple years younger than me. He’s so charming. You would love him. I love him. As a friend, right now. But it’s really a toss-up. He’s gorgeous. _

_ I heard him singing earlier this week and he didn’t seem to care about all the other fellas around. He was just singing some tune. I didn’t recognize it. And then when I asked him, he shrugged and said he wrote it. I don’t even know how to answer that. _

_ I think you’d love him. He’s got a way with people. I think he swings both ways. Seems to, if his equal-opportunity gratuitous flirting is anything to go by. Everyone is fair game. He’d eat you up, Jules, if you didn’t eat him up first. _

_ Oh, boy. It’s a good thing I pinned you down. God knows you’d fall for Donny in a second. I guess that wouldn’t really stop you. You pinned me down, but here I am, anyway. _

_ I’ll keep you posted on the war front unless the papers get to you first. Tell me about your life, though. I miss being a civilian. Tell me all the normal things. Your job, your mom, your new dress (I know you have one). Please. Your letters are a much-needed taste of real life. Of home. _

_ I love you, _

_ Michael _

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!! im on tumblr @vivilevone if you wanna come say hey. if you liked it leave a comment!! and that's all!! byeee


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